Family reunion and the price of bacon

So Ruth and I are now pretty much moved into our house sitting home for the next five weeks. We're located near the village of Manotick which is a kind of a trendy upscale village with a lot of very high end homes that line the Rideau River.

But we're a little unfamiliar with what are the best (least expensive?) grocery stores in the area. We ended up at a Your Independent and Ruth went inside while I stayed in the car.

Well, that was a successful day!

We were up at 5:30am Saturday morning, moving stuff around before it got too hot out. Man, that was a lot of work. We can't believe how one guy can own that much stuff. It really makes us appreciate our simple lifestyle!

People began arriving at about 8:00am for the 10:00am start of the auction. The auctioneer himself arrived at 9:00am, along with his five helpers! 

Ready for the auction!

Well, the big day is here. It took five of us pretty much all day to move almost everything outside. Only the larger furniture items remain inside. 

But it was pretty warm trying to move all that stuff around when the temperature was 32C (88F). We took a lot of breaks and drank a lot of water.

New sandals, and Sydney the cat...

Starting Saturday evening, we will be house and cat sitting for the next five weeks. So yesterday, we drove over to the community of Manotick just south of Ottawa to say hello to the couple who own the house, and to meet Sydney the cat.

We were supposed to be looking after two cats. But when we arrived, we were told that they had lost one. At first, we took that to mean it had passed away. But it was only ten years old. 

How to Keep Yourself Entertained as you Travel

By its nature, traveling will often have downtime where you have to spend hours doing little to nothing, which is why you should always be prepared to entertain yourself.

Travel with a Buddy

The first rule of traveling is to always travel with a buddy when you can. There are plenty of reasons why it’s a good idea to have a travel buddy, from safety to boredom, so it’s probably a good idea that you just make sure to take someone with you when you can. Travel to work with your coworkers, take your friends or family on holiday, go to the movies with others. Wherever you are traveling, don’t do it alone.

Cameron's watermelon pics

Another day of organizing auction stuff. We're actually just about done as much as we can do for now. There is nothing left in the basement except for our stuff which we will go through today. And upstairs is pretty much empty except for the heavier furniture.

When we had sold our house in 2007, we ended up with about a dozen Rubbermaid storage bins and had whittled that down to three over the years. As time went on, we just couldn't justify keeping the "stuff" and wondered why we kept most of it to begin with. 

The Essential Road Trip Tech

Whether you’re in an RV, camper van or in the SUV driving to your next holiday destination, there are a few essential tech items that you must have with you. Travel is always an exciting time and often there are things that are neglected in the planning phase that will adversely affect your trip. One of the main aspects that can be neglected is the tech that you take.

We'll get out and do our walk early before things warm up!

There's a really good circular walking route that we follow here in Galetta. It's exactly 5 kms (3 miles) and it's got a few small hills so it's really good exercise when it's done at a fast pace. As a bonus, it's really quite scenic too.

When we've done it in past years, our time for doing such a walk is usually about 45 minutes. That's a decent pace for walking, and we're definitely sweating when we're done. It's a good workout.

How to pass the time on long motorhome journeys

Motorhome journeys can be long and tedious if you aren’t driving and can feel like enormous wastes of time. Reaching the destination is exciting, but the route there is rarely so interesting. 

However, when you tweak your perspective and have a few great activities to keep you busy, the time will fly by.

Just a place to keep your stuff

The last few years it hasn't been that enjoyable for us to return to Canada. Sure, it's great to see family and friends again, but the majority of our free time had (and has) been taken up with dealing with Ruth's father and his possessions. 

I know, it's all part of life. But we'll just be glad when we can put this part of life behind us. And fortunately, we can see that happening on this trip.